Distance: 21.5km (486.3km), time spent: 9:18 (190:24).
Altitude (start / end / highest): 75m / 820m / 1487m.
Weather: An easy mix of sun, blue sky and clouds.
The time on the trail is ticking towards its end. I have a somewhat ambiguous relation to it now, there is something in me wishing to continue walking, but there is also a part of me that is ready to finish this trail. I cannot provide a good reason why, it may be because the Lycian Way has not met my expectations, though I doubt it. I have many great days behind me on the trail (as yesterday). Still, the finishing touch is probably missing.
Where the trail towards Hisarçandır starts from in Göynük Kanyonu.
Today however, there is an exciting day head of me, in several ways. I am excited since today I will come to the part of the trail I have been warned against. Somewhere on the path towards Hisarçandır there supposedly has been a rockslide and a forest fire, which has made it difficult to know where the path goes. I have on the other hand, been reassured that it is only talk of a very small section. My map does not go farther than to Göynük, so I have nothing to go by.
I have appreciated the time I have spent together with Melike, but today it is inevitably over. We eat a final breakfast together and then says goodbye, then I head back up to the entrance of the Göynük valley again.
Strawberry trees forever.
Since it is a privately owned park, it costs money to enter, but when I say that I am going to Hisarçandır, I do not have to pay the entrance fee. Instead, the guard embarks upon a long tirade and warns me not to go, at least not alone. He tells me that it is too dangerous, that I will get lost since there are no waymarks and that I will have to call for a rescue helicopter as others have done. If that happens, I will have to pay 2000 dollars, but he will not stop me if that is what I want. You get scared of less.
Yesterday, I saw where the path starts from, a small wooden sign pointing towards a path that quite shyly disappears behind some bushes. For safety reasons, I put on my gps and hope that I do not get to use it; my plan is to turn it on if the waymarks disappears and it gets difficult to orientate. I keep a steady pace upwards and get slightly confused by the fact that the waymarks almost never has been better. I am walking and always expect that they will disappear in thin air and that I will confound myself out into the periphery, but it never happens.
Sarıçinar Dağı hidden behind the clouds drifting across the mountains higher up.
In the valley, the trail keeps beneath the trees next to the now small creek running down in the middle of it. Small irrigation-pipes are sticking up from the path, with gurgling sounds coming from them. After an hour, I have already reached Sarıçinar pınarı (in the guidebook, the time estimate is three hours). It is a good campsite, but there is not much water running through the creek that was supposed to hold water all the year round. Views from the valley are randomly provided through the trees.
Antalya lies behind the mountains. Pointed and rugged peaks seen from the trail where it traverse through an area characterized by a forest fire.
At a grassy small pass, I have to take a short break, it seems that I have walked too fast and it was quite steep up. I have not had any problems finding the way, I still expect the waymarking to cease and that all the warnings I have received shall occur. After the pass, I slow down the pace, the guidebook estimates the walk to eleven hours, but I do not see any reason why I should use that long time.
Beneath the slopes of Sarıçinar Dağı, I quickly arrive at an area with charred and remaining trees after a fire. New undergrowth is about to form and is already grown for some time, so there must be a little while since the forest fire. The path is disappearing at times in the new vegetation, but not so much that a quick overview easily answers where the trail is continuing. Pointed peaks lies to the north of the path. Then the trail is ascending on a cool and rocky path.
At Hüdacık ridge, the trail goes through a small pass between the cliffs, cedar trees adorns each side of the path.
At Hüdacık ridge (1400m), where the trail goes through a small pass between the rocky cliffs, there are some stony precipices that I can climb out upon. From the tip, there is a great view towards the pointed peaks I was looking up at earlier. In the background, I can now see Antalya, yet another reminder that the journey soon is over. Sitting on the outermost boulder with the majestic cedar trees around me, I do have to admit that it has been a good walk; I thoroughly enjoy this part of the trail.
View from a precipice at Hüdacık ridge. Antalya is visible in the background.
The continuing path is also nice, I pass by Baba Çesme (Father's Spring), walk alongside shelves with view both downwards and outwards, over rocky paths in a nice forest, past an empty bottle of vodka. At Elmayanı Pınarı (Spring by the Apples), I sit down on one of the picnic benches there, a small fenced in mountain farm is situated below the spring. I take out my stove and prepares my lunch for the day, something I have done all too little, I have missed doing this on my walk and I cannot explain why I have not done it more. It is a quiet and peaceful place, until I hear the sound of shooting from the ridge above me. Hunt or not, a dog is coming at full speed down from the ridge and disappears just as quickly as it appeared.
The highest point (1487m) of today's walk is not far away, just a short walk on a forest track. Quite surprising is the different houses that exists at the pass, as if there is a small village located there. I am offered tea in one of the houses, which I pay five lira for, I drink my tea while wasps buzzes continuous around me. From the pass, the trail goes on a gravel track all the way down to Hisarçandır. I make a mental notice that it took a long time before I saw the first waymark again after the pass.
Lunch break at Elmayanı Pınarı.
Walking on the forest track does not compare with the rest of the walk so far today, which just got better and better the higher up I came, but it is pleasant enough. A signpost brings me back to what the guide in Yayla Kuzdere told me about, that he was working on an alternate route from Antalya. This may be the reason why one of the signs is pointing towards a place called Üçsöğüt Yaylası. In my guidebook, there is no such variant described and I do not have a map anymore that I can check out where the place is or where that route goes.
Above Hisarçandır. The original endpoint of the Lycian Way was next to the minaret by the mosque. In the background are the mountains that the trail crosses over on its way towards Geyikbayırı, the current endpoint of the trail.
Getting down to Hisarçandır took its time; so when I arrive good and well, I feel content with today's walk. So here it was that the trail originally ended, now two more days has been added to the trail, by Çitdibi to Geyikbayırı. Which in a way is understandable; there really is not anything in the village, even though it seems charming enough. Even with aid from Melike, it is apparent that I cannot find any place to stay here. I do have food, so I can just pitch my tent, there is a nice enough place just next to the road and the signpost (which before marked the endpoint), but I am not so fond of putting up my tent in the middle of a village. I feel invading for some reason.
I continue further towards Çitdibi, unsure of how far I will reach before it gets dark. The trail goes further downwards, on a gravel track at first and then on paths across dry and rocky fields. All the stones makes it hard to find a good place to camp (without having to spend a lot of time clearing a space). Below Hisarçandır Kale, which is now guarding over me from a small hilltop above, I doubt that I will get too much further. I find a small enclosure in the woods next to the path; the space is just wide enough that I can fit my tent in it. I decide to call it the day.
Hisarçandır Kale.
At the small clearing, I clear some space, pitch the tent and make a small perimeter with twigs and branches as a makeshift fence. Then I climb up to Hisarçandır Kale and goes ruinspotting. Of the old castle, there is just about only the walls left, which due to the location only needs to go halfway around. On the other side, the steep precipice forms a wall good as anyone. The evening is slowly approaching and on the sky, the sun makes a dramatic descent behind the mountains when I stand and looking down towards the Çandır-river far below. It would have been cooler to camp up at the castle; there are places for it here. I am happy that I chose to stop.
View from the top of the precipices that is the location of the ruins of Hisarçandır Kale.
Down by the tent again, I prepare to make dinner, but voices nearby is making me a little bit nervous. They seems to be looking for someone, just after Hisarçandır there were someone driving past me in a car and looking strange at me, so I just sit tight and quiet and listening. The voices are eventually disappearing. Probably, I had nothing to fear, but the time hearing voices looking for someone felt wrong. Afterwards it is quiet and peaceful. I cook my dinner, noodles, and is covered by darkness. In the end, I withdraw into my tent, where it is nice and cool. An extraordinary day. I spend the last night on the walk beneath the old fortress walls of Hisarçandır Kale.
<- GöynükGeyikbayırı ->
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